


By my Side

by OnlyAPerfectDisaster



Category: Darkest Powers - Kelley Armstrong
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-01-01
Updated: 2013-04-14
Packaged: 2017-12-04 18:52:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,222
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/713894
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/OnlyAPerfectDisaster/pseuds/OnlyAPerfectDisaster
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Chloe was always loved by her family. She was happy, and ready to face the world. Then, a large event occurs which sends her life reeling. AU</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Eyes Open

"Am I just floating around in this moment of time and space? It makes me wonder. A state of mind cause I'm just fading away And my head is lost up in the satellites I'm so far and gone to ever get it right Through unseeing eyes, day dreaming again Eternity is seemingly an endless waiting. Lost in forever Eternally, a limitless time it's never ending I'm lost in forever" -P.O.D. "Lost in Forever"

I can't close my eyes without seeing them. It's almost painful, calling me out of the present and my body, into the past almost as if I'm there again. One minute I'm sitting at the table with my aunt and the next, I'm on a plane to Tokyo my parents seated on either side of me. I'm ten years old again and so used to this it's almost boring.

My mother turns to me, totally calm and says, "What do you want to do in Tokyo, Chloe?"

I consider for a minute before answering. For my father everywhere we go is business, almost twenty four seven, but for my mother and me, it was a chance to learn something. Even if we'd been to a place before we always found something new to learn. My mother also made sure that not only was I educated about history, science and the world, but I also knew quite a few languages and was semi-skillful in math. Because of this, where I should have been in fifth grade, I was instead in the sixth grade level. "Where haven't we been before?"

"I really can't say… How do you feel about deciding when we get there?" She smiles at me, and I'm back in the present, my aunt asking if I'm ok.

Blink, I'm five, riding an elephant with my mother.

Blink, I'm thirteen, wandering an old museum looking at fossils and stuffed whales.

Blink, its two weeks ago, and I am sitting watching crappy daytime television in the penthouse living room with my aunt Lauren when the phone rings. She finishes folding a pair of socks and gets up to answer it. When she hangs up, she walks back over to me. She sits down, and I'm not really paying attention to her body language, so I ask, "Was that my parents? How are they?" I look away from the television as I say this and, I am surprised to see tears running down her cheeks. "What is it? What's wrong?"

My aunt has always been strong and never let her emotions get the best of her; it was what made her a great doctor. It takes her a minute, but, finally she manages to choke out, "Your parents, Chloe, their plane… it… crashed… ten minutes out of Paris…"

"W-w-what? Are they…"

"Dead? Yes, I'm sorry. Their saying it was nearly instant… painless."

This time when I open my eyes I know it's over for now. I am definitely not fine. "I-I think I'm going to go get ready…"

Leaving the table I felt her eyes training on my back as I walk toward my bathroom.

XxXxXxX

I have to force myself to turn off the water and step out of the shower, the feeling of the water the only thing keeping me sane. Opening the shower door, I step out and grab my crimson towel. I wrap it around myself and grab another towel for my hair. Then I pad out into the hall, wrapping it around my head. Sitting on my bed is a charcoal long sleeved cocktail dress, a black flower hair band for my hair and a pair of new black flats.I throw on some underwear and pantyhose, then grab the dress. After I dry off my hair I pull it on adjusting the gathering to where it was supposed to sit just above my right hip.

I pull out the stool that sits in front of the desk, in front of a mirror, that replaces a vanity. I look myself in the eyes, and see my parents faces reflected in the mirror, over taking mine. The only thing that doesn't shift is my eyes, brimmed with tears. The tears spill down the ever-changing cheeks leaving shiny trails. I wipe at them and look away. When I finally gather the courage to look up again, I see myself and it doesn't change.

I go back to the bathroom to hang the towels and wash my cheeks to get rid of the tear tracks. Back in front of my mirror, I am for once glad for looking younger than I am. I have barely ever had a zit, like the child I resemble. So, I have no reason for anything other than eye make-up and lip gloss. I line the inside of my eyes with black eyeliner then put one layer of mascara over my blonde lashes. Smearing a bit of light pink lip gloss over my bottom lip, I smack my lips together and clean up the edges of my lips a bit with a cotton swab.

Next, I tackle my thin wispy strands of hair. I load my hand up with moose and work it through my hair. After that I add some gel and a little bit of hair wax. Leaving a little bit of hair in front of my ears, framing my face, I pull the rest back into a loose bun. Grabbing a bottle of maximum hold hair spray, I liberally shower my head. I add the hair band sticking it through the pulled back hair I place it so the small black flower is on the opposite side of the gathering in my dress. I spray again, making sure that the style will last through leaving the door.

Finally finished, I headed for the door, reaching for the shoes and a grey trench coat. Stopping at the full length looking glass in the hall I pull on the shoes and trench coat and as I was in the store, am surprised to find the even though black completely washes me out, the charcoal color brought out my hair and eyes, and was just dark enough for the occasion.

I hear the sound of heels heading toward me and turn to see my aunt heading down the hallway toward me. "You ready?" Her voice is soft, semi-soothing and draws tears to my eyes. I blink them away and nod allowing her to lead me to the elevator and the car.


	2. Should Have

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Chloe attends her parents funeral. Dwells on should haves.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Umm... This story... Its got TRIGGERWARNINGS LIKE NOBODY BUSINESS. Depression, suicide, abuse, self harm, maybe eating disorders... So uh.. ya... loaded story here...

“You can't breathe until you choke  
You gotta laugh when you're the joke  
There's nothing like a funeral to make you feel alive  
Just open your eyes  
Just open your eyes  
And see that life is beautiful.  
Will you swear on your life,  
That no one will cry at my funeral?  
I know some things that you don't  
I've done things that you won't  
There's nothing like a trail of blood to find your way back home”  
SIXX A.M. “Life is Beautiful”

We pull up to the funeral home a few hours early for the funeral. When I don’t move, Aunt Lauren reaches across me and opens my door. “Chloe, we have to go in. There is no other way to do this.” She then unclips my seat belt like I’m two, and gently pushes me outside. I plant my feet on the ground and straighten, looking up at the beautiful old building. Funny, I’d never think a place so lovely, so grand, would be home to something so… depressing.   
Slowly, with Aunt Lauren at my side, I walk up the flight of ten stairs to get to the door. The doors were large and ornate, swirls and other embellishments twirled over their surface, begging to be touched. Mounted on each one was a large brass lion head door knocker, the ring clutched tightly in its jaws. Aunt Lauren ignores them and lightly raps on the dark mahogany surface. There is some scuffling and shuffling on the other side of the door, before it opens to reveal a man with a hooked nose and a large belly.  
“Hello,” He says, scrutinizing us before continuing, “How may I help you this fine morning?”  
“I am Lauren Fellows and this is my niece, Chloe Saunders.” My aunt tells him solemnly. “We are here to make sure everything is ready for my sister and her husband’s funeral, which is to take place this afternoon.”   
He nods and holds the door open for us, his vulture-y features making his piercing gaze all the more menacing. It’s a look that says ‘If you’re lying about who you are there will be serious consequences.’ As he leads us down a long hall, all I can see was the false cheery-ness and the décor. Fancy pictures line the walls as the long dead people portrayed in them study us with scrutiny. The floor is thick with carpet that you could almost imagine suffocating in and the hall was so long the walls almost look like they were closing in to squish us. The lights are too bright, too happy for place where the dead are remembered. Some of the doors that accompanied the paintings and pictures on the walls were half open showing rooms full of people, whether sitting down at a funeral of their own, or working hustling about coffins and a kitchen preparing for the next funeral to happen.   
We finally arrive at a small hall, like some of the others we saw with two closed caskets sitting on a raised platform in front. There is also a large photo of my parents that I took the day they left for Paris. My mother is half-awake, leaning on my father’s shoulder as he looks down at her alert and loving. You can see both their faces and you can tell they weren’t expecting to die the next day. They look happy and at peace. Something I am not. I can’t help thinking that I should have died too. All those planes, all those chances to crash, to die. And one of the few times I hadn’t been with them, they died. I should have been with them. I should have died too.   
Suddenly I feel tired, and I have to sit down. There are chairs I didn’t notice scattered about the room, in a semi-organized semi-circle. I lower myself down on one closest to the door, in case I can’t stand this place anymore. Breathing slowly, I try to stop the pain tearing through my head, the slow unsteady pounding of my heart. I stay there until family and friends from all over the world start pouring in through the doors.   
Aunt Lauren comes and gets me, leading me up to the chairs in the front of the hall. I take the seat beside her, and stare at the coffins on the stage. I know that there is nothing inside them, the plane crash being bad enough to disintegrate most of the people inside it. What was left at the site, my aunt had said, was unidentifiable, being so badly burned. Somehow, knowing my parents weren’t in there didn’t make me feel any better.   
People went up to the podium, people sat down. It went on like that for nearly an hour. I couldn’t hear a word that was said, nor could I see anything but the coffins. They sat there, closed and empty, taunting me, whispering that there should be three, no two on that pedestal thing. That I should not now what was going on. That I had failed them.   
“Chloe. Chloe. Chloe, hon, look at me,” Aunt Lauren is standing over me, her hand on my shoulder. I see double for a second, before my eyes focus and I look away from the coffins. “Chloe, we have to go outside. They’re burying the coffins soon. We have to leave so they can take them.” My aunt’s voice is gentle and so is her hand as she helps me stand up and make my way to the door.   
It’s sunny outside. Bright and happy. It hurts my eyes to be out there and it hurts my feelings that world couldn’t stop, even for a day, to turn desolate and brooding. We follow the group from the funeral to a plot of land shrouded by trees. There was one, wide hole in the ground, big enough for the two coffins. Slowly, we file around the hole, me staying towards the back near a tree. The funeral procession thing starts, and soon, my parents were in the ground, in a cement vault and covered with feet of dirt. As people say their last goodbyes, I run. I go through the trees and off the plot, just trying to get away. Finally, I come to a wrought iron fence that blocked me from the world. I slump against the fence and black out.

XxXxXxXxXxX

I wake up, just as someone puts me down onto the seat in my aunts car. The door closes and I open my eyes. I see my aunt talking to a large figure with black hair. He turns to leave, and looks in the window. He has green eyes. He sees I’m awake and wave. I lift my hand to wave back, but it’s too heavy. I black out once again.


End file.
